


run for home

by TardisIsTheOnlyWayToTravel



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Cap2 spoilers, Gen, The Winter Soldier - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-14
Updated: 2014-04-14
Packaged: 2018-01-19 08:59:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,376
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1463437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TardisIsTheOnlyWayToTravel/pseuds/TardisIsTheOnlyWayToTravel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The memories trickle back slowly.</p><p>[Spoilers for Captain America: The Winter Soldier]</p>
            </blockquote>





	run for home

The memories trickle back slowly, clumping together over time, until he’s left with something vaguely resembling a picture of someone else’s life. They’re old memories, withered and fractured; but they’re the closest thing he has to an understanding of who he is, and he hoards them close, studies them the way he would a target before a mission.

It’s been thirty-three days since he tried to kill Captain America and failed, because of some impulse he didn’t understand, some long-silenced voice inside himself crying out, and while it was silent again, the fact that it had stirred at all left him perturbed and wondering. Now he’s all alone in a safehouse, as he has been for the last month: no orders, no mission, no one to report to. He’s never gone so long without a mission before, and he can feel things whirling free in his mind, like tiny cogs and springs in a machine. He doesn’t know whether he should be terrified, and wonders at the prospect of feeling that kind of emotion at all.

He has a name, now – _your name is James Buchanan Barnes –_ and he’s pretty sure that it should mean more to him than it does. He’s never had a name before, that he can remember: but then, the are so many things he cannot remember, and the few things he can are jumbled-up, confused, broken, leaving him grasping desperately for meaning.

James Buchanan Barnes isn’t familiar: he feels no twinge of déjà vu, no nostalgia for that name. But it’s a name, which is more than he had before.

He thinks about the Captain a lot. He’s stopped thinking of him as the Target and started thinking of him as the Captain instead, because he doesn’t know what the Captain is but he’s not a target, not anymore. They were friends, the Captain had said. Friends. He doesn’t know much about the Captain, only what was in the dossier he was given, and everything he read was all cold facts which don’t help him now at all. But he’s seen flyers for an exhibition at the Smithsonian, with the Captain’s cowled face on them, so he goes there to learn more. It’s a risk – if anyone is looking for him, they won’t be pleased by his initiative – but he finds himself curious, for the first time in a long time (at least, as far as he can remember).

He doesn’t expect to find himself staring at his own face, but there it is, in sepia tones, part of a display about James Buchanan Barnes. For a long moment he stares incredulously: because no matter what the Captain told him, no matter what he remembers (he never trusts his memory) here is actual _proof_ right in front of him. He thought that he was prepared for this, but he isn’t: there is an entire life laid out in front of him, belonging to a man who is, apparently, him.

He pulls him cap further down over his eyes to better hide his face, and steps closer to the display, and reads.

He learns that James “Bucky” Buchanan Barnes was Captain America’s childhood friend and wartime ally, at his back since they were children. It’s a simple, sanitised account of one man’s life – one that gives him no other qualities other than war hero and Captain America’s sidekick – but it’s more than he really expected to find. It disturbs him.

He wanders through the rest of the exhibition, playing at being just another interested bystander, learning what he can. There’s a video of some dame talking about the Captain, and the sound of her voice prompts a twinge of familiarity, but that’s all. There’s another video, of James Buchanan Barnes and Captain America, which catches his attention. James Buchanan Barnes is laughing, bright and carefree, and it’s a strange look to see on his own face. But it’s the Captain he finds himself staring at, the Captain smiling with all the brightness and warmth of the sun – so different from the sombre, pained man he tried to kill. He finds himself wanting to reach out to that bright smile, to carry it away with him somehow.

He stares at that video clip for a long time, and wonders what happened to Captain America and James Buchanan Barnes.

* * *

It isn’t hard to break into the Captain’s new apartment. It’s mostly bare but for some furniture, a couple of knick knacks, and a record player and record collection. On impulse, he lifts up one of the records and looks at it. The song title and singer mean nothing to him, but that’s unsurprising. He puts the record on, somehow knowing how to o so, and music begins to play.

The music is sad, lonesome, wistful, and it tugs at some part of him that _hurts_. He stops the record, and barely contains the urge to snatch it up and throw it against the wall. But it’s not his record, and he doesn’t want to start out by breaking the Captain’s things, so he slides the record back into its sleeve and puts it back where he found it.

“Yeah, sometimes it hits me that way, too,” says a voice behind him, and he startles and turns, ready to lash out.

“Easy,” says the voice, and it’s the Captain, standing in the doorway with an unreadable look on his face, something pained about his eyebrows. For a moment they stare at each other.

There’s a flash of memory, there and gone again, of someone much smaller and thinner, but with the same determined features and resolute way of standing.

“I thought you were smaller,” he says, without quite knowing why.

Pain and hope flicker over the Captain’s face, and he watches avidly, fascinated by his ability to provoke a response in this man, a response that isn’t simply fear or terror.

“Yeah, I was,” the Captain says after a moment, speaking carefully. “A long time ago.”

The memories are still fuzzy and indistinct, and mostly not there, but he knows that the Captain is right.

“I remember you,” he says, and the Captain’s face lights right up, as though he can’t help it. “Just a little. Not much else.”

The hope in the Captain’s face dims a little, but a lot of it remains. He’s surprised.

“Well,” says the Captain finally, “that’s something.”

The Captain takes a step closer, and he lets him, stays where he is as the Captain draws near.

“I thought you were dead,” says the Captain, and he’s breathing strangely, his voice all choked up. “Bucky, I’m so sorry.”

The Captain puts a hand on his shoulder, the one that isn’t metal, and comes closer still. The Captain folds around him, gently, and he wonders what the Captain’s doing. He feels strangely unthreatened by the action, and stands still as the Captain hugs him, unsure of how to respond.

After a moment the Captain steps back, a rueful smile on his lips.

“Sorry about that,” the Captain says. His eyes are wet. “I just- I just needed to do that, for a second.”

He doesn’t understand why the Captain needed to do what he just did, but he doesn’t begrudge him the action, either. He can tell a friendly gesture from a hostile one, and knows that incomprehensible though they are, the Captain’s motives aren’t hostile.

“I’m not him,” he tells the Captain. “I’m not your friend. I don’t know who I am.”

This time the Captain’s smile is sad.

“I know,” says the Captain, smiling that sad smile. “But maybe I can help you find out.”

He thinks that over, and finally nods. Why else would he be here, if he didn’t want the Captain’s help? The fact that a moment ago he had no idea what he was doing here doesn’t matter at all.

“What do you want me to call you?” the Captain asks, after another short silence.

He considers the question, and thinks of a memory, of himself falling as the man above him screamed _“Bucky!”_ and remembers the display at the Smithsonian. He hesitates.

“Bucky,” he says eventually. The name sounds right in his mouth. He savours the feeling. “I want you to call me Bucky.”

 


End file.
